


After School Special

by tourdefierce



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Dubious Consent, Explicit Language, F/M, Homophobic Language, M/M, Non-Graphic Violence, Prostitution, bottom!Arthur
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-04
Updated: 2012-06-04
Packaged: 2017-11-06 19:37:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/422461
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tourdefierce/pseuds/tourdefierce
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Like most teenage boys, Merlin's life revolved around Call of Duty and putting a minimal amount of effort into school to get the maximum result, while dedicating his remaining free time to more important pursuits, like getting laid. He was doing pretty well for himself, considering he was kind of funny looking and definitely not popular. Then Arthur Pendragon came long and fucked it all up. (Well, there was also Gwaine. Dammit. He might as well start there.)</p><p>[Written for prompts #53, in which Merlin is the person that everyone goes to for homework/exams and Arthur goes to him.]</p>
            </blockquote>





	After School Special

**Author's Note:**

> **Notes:** Massive thank you to my two betas: L and S. They helped with brainstorming, fixed my mixing of American/British weirdness and managed my flagrant abuse of punctuation. As, I am a strange lady, there is a ridiculous soundtrack to this fic and can be found at the end ~~in youtube links~~ just as suggested listening. 
> 
> **Full list of warnings:** Dub-con prostitution (exchange of homework  & sexual acts), language (homophobic, explicit, & general overuse of the word 'jizz' because Merlin's a teenager), some non-graphic violence, underage sexy-times and references to past sex (all characters are 17 years old or older), and bottom!Arthur (if that upsets you). 
> 
> **Disclaimer:** The characters depicted herein belong to Shine and BBC. I make no profit from this endeavor.

Looking back, it was all Gwaine's fault. Before Merlin had met Gwaine, all he knew about Arthur Pendragon was limited to the freakish amount of sports he played at school (soccer in the fall, basketball in the winter and baseball in the spring) and their _occasional_ run ins that Merlin spent most of the time ignoring. As far as Merlin knew, all Arthur did was flounce around being perfect and spent too much time participating in activities that required questionable amounts of spandex. 

See, Gwaine was Merlin's neighbor—so in reality, it was probably geography or the realtor who sold Gwaine's mom their house's fault—but if they hadn't been neighbors, Merlin was positive they wouldn't have met. Gwaine was popular, fucking gorgeous and athletic and always looked a bit dim to be honest. After the first couple of weeks of school, Merlin was certain that Gwaine was simply going to be another boy to fantasize about in the comfort of his bed and outwardly keep the hell away from if he valued his life. He didn't really mind one way or another if he got beat up by some jock but his mom would go absolutely insane. So, Merlin was positive that the only good he was going to get out of Gwaine was some nice strip-teases and wet, glistening muscles because of the pool Gwaine had in his backyard. 

That was until four weeks into junior year, when Gwaine knocked on Merlin's door. 

"Hey Merlin," he had said, as if greeting each other with more than a fleeting second of eye contact was normal for them. 

"Um, hi?" 

Gwaine smiled, all perfect teeth and Merlin refused to be charmed. Even if Gwaine had an eight-pack. 

"Listen, have you taken Advanced Trig before?" 

"Four years ago," Merlin said, wary. "Why?" 

Gwaine shrugged. "I'm not going to beat around the bush here. Percy said you tutored him and that's real swell and all, but I don't have time to be tutored. So I thought I'd make you a deal." 

Merlin raised an eyebrow. 

"Do I look like the kind of person who cheats?" 

This time, when Gwaine smiled, it was more of a smirk. "From what Percy said, you could do this shit in your _sleep_ because you're like some sort of boy-genius." 

"What if I am?"

"Well, if you are and you don't mind doing this assignment for me, then I could pay you."

Merlin felt himself bristle. "Just because I don't have a pool or a brand new car or _designer jeans_ ," he sneered. "That doesn't mean that I need your fucking pity." 

Gwaine held up his hands. "I never said that," he said and then his smile shifted, into something more coy. Merlin was distracted by his tongue. "But if you're not looking to make some cash. I wouldn't mind sucking your dick." 

That was when Merlin swallowed his own tongue and spent the next five minutes coughing while Gwaine stood there and smirked. 

Needless to say, Gwaine and Merlin came to a truce. For the most part, Merlin would tutor Gwaine so that he could get his community service required for graduation out of the way sometime before next century. But when Gwaine was too busy with sports and school to keep up, Merlin would do his assignments and let Gwaine get on his knees and suck out Merlin's brains through his cock while jacking off all over Merlin's shoes. 

It was a beneficial relationship. They weren't _boyfriends_ or anything stupid like that. Gwaine was a nice guy and all, easy on the eyes and had one hell of a mouth but for the most part, they just ran in completely different circles. They did end up becoming pretty good friends in the end but never at school. It was too complicated. But outside school, it was nice to have someone to hang out with that wasn't Gwen or Will—someone separate. 

On top of it all, Gwaine always suggested Merlin to his teammates and Merlin set up a pretty lucrative practice tutoring after he completed his community service. (And his mother didn't have to work so many shifts at the hospital to pad Merlin's college fund. It was more of an expenses fund because they both knew that Merlin wasn't going unless there was a hell of a scholarship involved.)

He _rarely_ outright helped anyone cheat and he definitely didn't have any sort of special deal with any of the other jocks. In fact, as far as he knew, Gwaine was the only slightly gay jock in Ealdor and probably in all of Albion. Not that Gwaine considered himself gay because it seemed to Merlin that everyone knew that Gwaine was just constantly horny and willing to let the lines of gender preference blur. Gwaine liked it anyway he could get it, which was often, and wasn't ashamed, if the amount of times he had been caught in the backseat of his car in the parking lot were any sign... or if the rumours about him and Principle Kay had any ounce of truth. 

Luckily for Gwaine, he could get away with it because he was, essentially, a god—due to the ridiculous high-school hierarchy of the world. If anyone said anything in the locker room about Gwaine sucking cock or the ever eloquent "fudge-packer" label, Merlin never heard about it. 

Merlin wasn't going to complain about Gwaine getting on his knees. It probably wouldn't have worked out if Gwaine hadn't been such an enthusiastic slut, but he was and Merlin certainly wasn't going to say no—even if Merlin was all too aware of the line that truly divided them; Merlin and the beautiful, untouchable people like Gwaine. 

Thus, Merlin's junior year was seriously looking up, until Gwaine up and broke the unspoken rule they had: _don't tell anyone about the cock sucking_. 

Looking back, Merlin knew he should have gotten that part in writing.

———

_Thank fuck I'm a genius_ , Merlin thought as he stumbled out of Advanced Calculus rubbing sleep from his eyes and generally falling all over people in the general direction of his locker.

"Do you ever sleep at your own house?" 

Merlin squinted.

"What?"

"Merlin, open your eyes." 

Will was slouched up against Merlin's locker, looking to the whole world like Merlin was insane and like Will had spent the better part of the last period awake and you know, learning. Merlin shrugged. 

"You live at my house, man. You know I'm around," Merlin said, shoving a few books into his locker and trying to find his AP World History textbook. Why he even attempted to take it to class he didn't know, since he'd already read it and it wasn't like he needed to reread it. Who had the patience for studying? Tedious. 

"Merlin, you sleep through AP Calc every other day. What's your other first period class?" 

"Organic Chem," he said through a yawn. 

Will shook his head. "You are truly pathetic. Some seriously wasted potential. You could be like, ruling the world or designing nuclear weapons to rule the world and you're here, in Ealdor High, looking _high_ —"

"I haven't even had the time to smoke yet," Merlin muttered with a smirk. "Listen, Will, you need to chill the fuck out. Why would I want to be running the world now? I'll wait to do that when I'm fat and balding. At the moment, I've got AP World History to get through with Gwen mooning over that dude—"

"Her boyfriend, Lance."

"What-the-fuck-ever, alright? His hair’s so shiny and he's so damn nice that I actually want to vomit when I see them together. Sometimes I wish I was straight, if only to go back in time and start dating Gwen in 7th grade so that I could spare the world from the suffering of the _breeders_ —"

Will put his hand in Merlin's face. 

"It’s way too early for the I'm Gay And I Hate The World speech," he shut Merlin's locker and shuffled down the hall, calling back to Merlin. "See you for lunch!"

Will was the best cousin anyone could honestly hope for. Although it was seriously awful that his mom died when they were both young, Merlin wasn't sure he would have survived high school if it wasn't for Will's stupid ass hanging around all the time. 

The two minute bell rang. 

"Shit," Merlin mumbled, checking his books in his hands. 

Only to get shoved into the lockers a bit.

"Fag."

He turned around, sneer already in place. "Oh, Valiant! What did I tell you about touching me? It's contagious. One touch from me and you'll be taking my cock left, right and center!" 

Valiant growled, slightly feral as usual, but when he lunged for Merlin there was the ever present knight-in-shining-armor. 

"Knock it off, Valiant. I do not have time for your shit," Arthur Pendragon said, all low and calm like he had this perfectly under control. He even had the balls to turn back and nod at Merlin, small smile that barely showed his perfectly straight teeth.

Like he was just doing his duty, no need to thank him because he patted himself on the back daily. 

It anything, it put Merlin in a worse mood. 

"I can take care of myself, Pendragon," Merlin growled, stepping back to wave at Valiant and the other jocks crowded around them. "Don't let me keep me from your circle jerk, boys. Leave me _alone_ ," he said toward Arthur Pendragon's wide, blue eyes and stalked off. 

What the hell was his problem? Who the _fuck_ did he think he was? Seriously! Who transfers schools—no, wait, _countries_ —their sophomore year and ends up as popular as him? It was probably his Hugh Grant accent or his hair, that might shine in the sunlight like gold, or the way he was captain of every sport possibly imaginable or, really, the fact that he was impossibly nice, for a jock, and that he always stood up for Merlin—

Merlin shook his head. 

He was already three minutes late. 

The fact that he would rather face Breederfest with Lance and Gwen than think about Arthur Pendragon should have been a sign.

———

"I don't know why you're so mean to him."

Merlin gaped at her. "Gwen, do I need to remind you that I am the only out gay male at this school?" 

"No."

"Don't roll your eyes! Guys like Pendragon aren't actually nice. His Hemingway-act is just that—a fucking act. I don't need any more friends, Gwen, and I certainly don't need to risk getting beat up for being a fag just so I can be friends with a popular jock like Pendragon," Merlin said as casually as he could. It wasn't something that really bothered him all that much. He had plenty of friends. He really didn't need any more. Even if it was hard to be mean to guys like Pendragon when they looked that good. To be fair, Merlin had been perfectly cordial to everyone until they all hit fifteen and realized that the funny kid with the ears wasn't kidding about girls having cooties. 

"Arthur’s different," Gwen pleaded. Lance dutifully nodded along with her. Merlin didn't know anyone in the world that was more whipped than Lance, and Merlin was also privy to the knowledge that Gwen still had her v-card. Even the promise of getting laid made Lance a docile cow. 

Well. Or he was just a decent human being. 

Merlin squinted at the board. They were doing 'group work', which was mostly code for gossiping while Mr. Geoffrey went to run errands. 

"Gwen, I tutor jocks like Arthur and for the most part, it's working out alright. I don’t need to be saved by guys like him, who probably have a permanent head injury, because we aren’t friends. Pendragon and I will never be friends. We have nothing in common. Unless his dad wants to contribute to my college fund, then he can fuck right off," Merlin finished with a pointed glare that left Gwen shaking her head. 

Merlin turned to Lance. "If Pendragon mentions his good deeds in the locker room, please remind him that I’m much smarter than him and thus, can figure out a way to take care of myself." 

Lance shrugged. 

"Now," Merlin said, looking back to Gwen. "Can we get back to this project? I want to get this done and go outside because Gwen, I see sunshine. It’s spring outside this prison. I don’t want to spend my time arguing about Prince Pendragon's shiny hair and hero complex, nor do I want to do this damn project. I want to go outside. I want to get high. I want to get grass-stains on my—"

Gwen laughed, hitting him on the shoulder, but the topic of conversation moved on. 

Not that it really stopped Merlin from thinking about how Arthur Pendragon really was a walking jerk-off fantasy, or wondering what the hell he was playing at pretending to be Merlin's friend, but it helped to push it out of his mind. 

At least until they did end up outside for lunch, only to find out that springtime took quite a shine to Arthur as well. 

Merlin had to eat his entire lunch with a boner because his dick didn't understand that jocks like Arthur and the rest of his stupid friends didn't take their shirts off and play touch football on the lawn for Merlin but for the cheerleaders and their group of beautiful women. 

He only resented their perky breasts a little bit. 

Except for Morgana. She may hold court as the coolest girl in school but she still managed to have both perky breasts and an extraordinary capacity for brains. She was alright, even if she did scare Merlin a little bit. It was all that hair and the fact that Merlin once had a dream that Morgana and Arthur had a freak accident in chemistry and became one person.

At least, that was what he told Will and Gwen. 

The dream mostly just had Arthur on his back, begging for Merlin's cock whilst fondling his breasts, which spilled out of some truly impressive lingerie akin to the way Morgana's tried to break free from every t-shirt she owned.

Merlin had blamed it on latent heterosexuality. 

Hey. It could happen. 

When he finally gave up and decided to go back inside or risk coming in his pants, Gwaine gave him a wink from where he was groping Pendragon's ass in celebration of his winning pass. 

Merlin gave him the finger.

———

Merlin was playing Call of Duty (and not thinking about what it would be like to hump Pendragon in the back of his car) when Gwaine walked in. His hair was a mess, like he didn't bother with the air conditioning in his car on the way home from practice and left the windows down. He was smiling, leaning against Merlin's doorjamb like the beginning of a porno.

"Who let you in?" 

"Backdoor was open." 

Merlin snorted, "Burglar." 

"A sex burglar." 

Merlin paused the screen. "You're ruining my childhood, you pervert." 

Gwaine just thrusted his hips in a way that really wasn't sexy, just weird looking but it got them both to laugh. He ended up collapsing next to Merlin on his bed and Merlin let him. He un-paused the screen and finished the mission. 

"Bruce Greenwood's voice over always kind of turned me on," Gwaine said. "I am man enough to admit to jerking off while listening to him give a sit-rep." 

Merlin threw the Xbox controller at him and Gwaine curled to catch it, his shirt riding up to reveal a tanned bit of skin. Well, it wasn't really tanned with it just being March but it was much tanner than Merlin's - his skin blinded people during the summer. 

"You really are a special kind of perv." 

Gwaine shrugged and then pulled Merlin down, an almost headlock and almost cuddle as they shifted to make room for both of them on the bed. 

"Speaking of pervs," Gwaine said, with mischief that Merlin hoped would be applied to sex and not making his life miserable. It was a toss up most of the time. "I saw you at lunch." 

"Don't worry, Gwaine. I wasn't—" 

Gwaine laughed. "I should be offended you've got eyes for Pendragon, you know. I might get jealous." 

"I don't! You asshole, I don't—" but Gwaine was only laughing harder, pushing Merlin's head into his sweaty armpit in a fit of childishness. 

Merlin bit the soft juncture between his shoulder and his chest, not letting up until Gwaine squawked and fell off the bed. 

"I don't—Pendragon," Merlin huffed, lying back on the bed and trying to catch his breath by staring at the ceiling. "Pendragon is a fucking cunt. He's—" Merlin waved his hand in the air, hoping to convey _self-righteous, rich jock_ and not _the star of all my jack-off fantasies and probably a good guy under all that testosterone-addled bullshit_. It was hard to tell if he pulled it off. But, to be fair, most people had a problem painting Pendragon in a bad light. He was too pretty. Will had a theory that his hair was performing hypnosis on the whole school. 

Merlin couldn't argue. Neither could his dick, which did 80% of his thinking for him most of the time. 

Another giggle floated up from the floor before Gwaine sat up and peered at Merlin from the edge of the bed. 

"Are you telling me that your dick didn't perk up at the sight of Arthur's nipples today? Because I find that incredibly hard to believe." 

Merlin glared. The flush on his cheeks was just because they'd been fighting. Not because... not because of Pendragon. Merlin went back to looking at the ceiling. 

"My dick isn't interested in Pendragon." 

"Not in his broad shoulders? What about his thick thighs? Or that shiny blond hair? Don't you want to see if the curtains match? Hmm?" 

Merlin hated Gwaine. 

He really fucking did. 

"What do you know about it?" Merlin said, still refusing to meet Gwaine's eyes. God. Why was he being such an asshole? "You got a crush on Prince Pendragon?"

Gwaine really giggled this time. "I can't believe you're lying to me right now. I regularly put your dick in my mouth and you're lying to me about wanting to give Pendragon the dicking of his life." 

He stopped giggling and stood up, hands on hips as he shook his head. Merlin glared but it was hard to ignore the way his dick twitched, which to be fair, wasn't a sign of anything. The other day, he got a hard on while doing a physics problem and got come on his calculator. He was seventeen! His dick was like a sentient being and it generally didn't give a fuck if Merlin was on board or not. 

"Did you come around just to give me shit about Pendragon, which is completely unjustified, or are we gonna mess around?" He knew he sounded petulant but he really, really did not want to talk about Pendragon. 

Gwaine shrugged. "It's a shame, Merlin, that you're lying to me right now because I have a serious medical condition. I cannot, on pain of death, put the dick of a liar in my mouth. Terrible things happen. Kittens die, puppies drown."

For fuck's sake.

"Are you kidding me right now!?" 

Gwaine just back toward the door. "Sorry, man. It's a terrible condition, but I must bear it on my own." 

"I'm going to kill you," Merlin said. 

"Hey! Since you're going to blame this on Pendragon anyway, why don't you tell him off yourself when he comes over tomorrow?" 

Merlin sat up. "What." 

Gwaine's face was pure and utter glee. He was such a bastard. Merlin really was never going to do his homework again. He was going to murder him instead. 

" _Prince_ Pendragon needs some homework help," Gwaine said, backing out the door with a truly shit-eating grin. "Be careful when you dick that knowledge to him, he's tender." 

The only thing that stopped Merlin from getting up and sprinting after Gwaine and his stupid fucking grin was the fact that running with a hard on was not conducive to Merlin's health. 

Instead, he turned Call of Duty back on and jerked off, angrily stroking his cock to the sound of Bruce Greenwood barking out orders and _not_ thinking about Arthur. With or without perky breasts. And if he came so hard that jizz actually hit him in the eye, which stung like a bitch, then it was because of Bruce Greenwood and not because of anything else. 

Not because of Pendragon. 

Or his nipples. 

"Fuck," Merlin said, staring at his still half-hard dick in his hand and trying not to rub his eye. 

"Seriously. Fuck."

———

The next four days were terribly over dramatic. Merlin spent most of his time at school trying to ninja between classes without being seen and when he was at home, he stayed glued to Will's side. The logic being that if Arthur Pendragon was going to a) turn him in for helping Gwaine pass his classes with the aid of blowjobs or b) come beat the shit out of him for turning Gwaine gay, then there would at least be a witness.

His mind was a scary place, okay. There was a lot going on up there. 

But as the spring warmth of Saturday turned into the dull gray skies of night, Merlin was convinced Gwaine was just being a bastard for the fun of it. 

"What would Pendragon need with tutoring anyway?" Merlin said to Will as he dressed for some sort of debate party. 

"I think you're obsessing." 

Merlin glared from his position as a star-fish on Will's bed, which was totally a size bigger than his and just blatantly unfair. 

"I think that tie looks like it spent some quality time in a sewer," Merlin pointed out and Will shrugged before ripping out the knot and going to hunt in his closet for another one. 

"I just think it's strange, Will. Arthur's doing fine in all his classes." 

"How would you know?" 

Merlin watched as Will practically fell into the depths of his closet. "I hacked into the school's records." 

"I can't tell if you're really smart or just the creepiest guy I've ever met." 

Merlin shrugged. "Do you think Gwaine told him?" 

"It's hard to predict what goes on in Gwaine's head," Will said accurately. "I mean, if I was taking it from a geek on a regular basis, I wouldn't want to broadcast it—especially to my captain."

"But?" 

Will wiggled into his shoes and made a scrunched up face. He was starting to get freckles on his nose from the sun of the last few weeks. They made him look ten times more innocent, the sly bastard, he was going to get so much tail tonight. Debate kids ate that kind of shit up. 

"But Gwaine is strange, isn't he? Besides, maybe all Pendragon's posturing is just his way of expressing his epic gay feelings for you." 

Merlin scoffed. "Unlikely." 

"Hey man, not all jocks are straight. If we can learn anything from Gwaine's rogue sexuality, it's that," Will said with his eyebrows raised, as if Merlin was going to deny the general fooling around Will had to listen to some times by sheer consequence of sharing a wall with Merlin's room. "Do I look alright?" 

"Yeah, you'll get laid." 

Will rolled his eyes. "I knew that, dick-head. Just—is this tie fine?" 

"It's ten times better than the last one, what was that color? Vomit, A Color by Moss and Sewage?" 

Will was ten minutes late, but it was only because he was trying to smother Merlin with a pillow.

———

Maybe it was Will, or the fact that Gwaine's house was dark, that Merlin let his guard down. It was cold enough for a jacket, but not enough for Merlin to pass-up sitting outside. Merlin's mom loved to garden, when she had the time, and it was turning a bright green over the past few rains. The flowers were blooming in tiny buds all over their beds and it was starting to look like their own little garden of Eden. Additionally, Will and him had bought her some solar lamps to go with the bench that Will made in woodshop for Christmas. So after raiding the fridge, Merlin grabbed a book, a hoodie, and some headphones and headed outside.

He could have called Gwen to hang out but they were already doing something tomorrow. He wasn't feeling particularly social anyway. He stretched his long legs out on the bench, stuffing his shoes underneath the armrest and tugging his hoodie down the small of his back where it rode up. He'd read until he got too cold and then maybe he'd watch a movie and go to bed. 

Everything was fine until Arthur Pendragon showed up. 

"Holy fucking shit," Merlin _did not_ squeal, when he looked up from his book to see Arthur Pendragon standing in the middle of his backyard as if someone had invited him there. He did, however, almost fall off the bench. 

"Um, hi," Arthur said, waving from where he was. 

"Hi? Pendragon, what the hell are you doing?" Merlin struggled trying to get his feet untangled from the bench. "Did you break into my house?" 

"No! No, I just, no one was answering the door so I thought," he said, hands stuffed inside of his pockets and shit, was he blushing? "I saw you over the fence." 

"Right," Merlin replied, trying not to get distracted by the way Pendragon rocked a bit on his heels, looking tragically adorable and so desperately attractive, that Merlin was feeling a bit light-headed. "Well, what do you want?" 

The thing was, everything coming out of his mouth had lost its edge. At school, the walls themselves were a constant and vivid reminder of what high-school was, what it stood for, and the distance between him and Pendragon seemed like a canyon. Here, in the cocoon of his mother's garden, it was hard to remember that him and Pendragon were on different sides of the fence. They weren't friends. In fact, Merlin didn't even know him—beyond what the snooping in his school records or the rumors at school or the weird way that Arthur was always there to interfere with a jock's fist and Merlin's face. 

It just... it felt weird. 

"I'm not doing well in physics," Arthur said and he was most certainly blushing now. Merlin narrowed his eyes. That was a lie. As it stood, Arthur had a solid 96 in physics. 

"I'm not your academic advisor. What does that have to do with me?" 

"Don't be a twat," confidence back, even if Merlin could still see the flush of his cheeks. "Everyone knows you tutor." 

Embarrassment flared hot. "Come to bestow some money on me then, Pendragon? Feeling kingly enough to give a peasant some scraps of cash?" God. He fucking hated money so goddamn much. And more than that, he hated the people who had cash. 

"I don't need your pity," Merlin said, standing up and crossing his arms. "So stop lying, I don't need or want your filthy money." 

"Wait, I'm not lying—listen, just fuck," Arthur said with frustration, pulling his hands out of his pockets and rubbing the back of his neck. "I really would appreciate your help, the guys said you are the only reason they can understand anything in tutorial or stay caught up on work when we miss lectures for games." 

"Which guys?" 

"Pardon?" 

Merlin glared. "I said, which of the guys did you talk to?" 

"Percy mentioned it but Gwaine—" 

Merlin tensed. What did Gwaine say?

"—he was the one who really pushed me to come here. He said he mentioned that I might be coming by, but clearly not because you are upset and this is not going how I planned," Arthur finished. He looked angry but embarrassed too and possibly a little disappointed. Merlin tried not to get distracted by his golden-retriever demeanor. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have come here. It was mental. Why would you help me, when you've made it perfectly clear that you despise me. I'm sorry, pardon me for intruding." 

Arthur turned away, heading for the gate of the fence. For a few fleeting seconds, Merlin was willing to let him walk straight out of the garden. Funnily enough, those seconds were the last fleeting seconds of sanity that Merlin would have for a long while. 

"Wait," Merlin said, his voice so loud and awkward. "I don't hate you."

"Even if I am a posh wanker who plays sport?" Arthur's response was soft, but not completely self deprecating. Definitely more recognizable. 

"Even if I can't understand you." 

Merlin laughed, watching the line of Pendragon's spine soften and the breadth of his shoulders seemed less tense. They were still lovely, filling out his basketball hoodie that made Merlin think about how warm it would be there, between his shoulder blades. 

"So you'll do it?" Arthur turned, leaning against the fence now. He was looking cocky again, confident now that Merlin had all but agreed. Merlin was reminded strongly of him and Gwaine's first encounter. 

"I'm sure I can find time to tutor you. It's just physics," Merlin said, confident too. Pendragon may be athletic and popular—more attractive than Merlin could ever be—but when it came to school, Merlin was the all-star player. 

"Tutoring isn't really what I had in mind." 

The tension between them shifted, as it had done so often between them. Merlin felt like he was constantly struggling to understand where they stood together, the ground shifting beneath him just when he thought he figured it out. But now, Arthur didn't look flushed with embarrassment. His eyes were hooded and he licked his lips, pushing off from the fence and closing the space between them in a few long strides. Distantly, Merlin thought about the length of Arthur's legs, he was barely an inch shorter than Merlin, but his legs were thick with endurance training.

Merlin's throat was suddenly very dry. 

"What," he said, clearing his throat. "What—" 

"I can't pay you," Arthur replied, eyes downcast and just a shadow of the boy that Merlin was familiar with. "My father can't know. He can't but like I said," his voice shifted, eyes lifting to meet Merlin's again. There was probably something there, with Pendragon's dad, but Merlin couldn't focus. They were too close together. 

Merlin could _smell him_. 

"Like, I said," Pendragon continued, "Gwaine told me that wouldn't be a problem." 

With that, they were no long standing toe to toe because with a solid thud, Pendragon's knees hit the ground and before Merlin could say anything more than the gasp that was punched out of his lungs, his jeans were pushed down and his cock was being dragged out of his boxers. 

ArthurfuckingPendragon was on his knees. 

In front of Merlin. 

In his backyard. 

"Holy fuck," Merlin gasped, but it was hardly audible over the sloppy slurp of Pendragon opening his mouth and sucking Merlin's cock into his wet mouth. 

Merlin had never gotten harder faster in his entire life. 

He honestly thought he might die. Was he dreaming? Did he die and go to some sort of heaven when all the dreams he ever denied having were coming true? Oh, dear god, was that Pendragon's _tongue_? His dick was throbbing, pulsing in the confines of Pendragon's lush mouth.

"Oh my fucking god." 

Pendragon didn't seem to mind his limited vocabulary, simply blinking his eyes wetly as he enthusiastically suckled at Merlin's cock. It was filthy and just then, when a hint of teeth scraped awkwardly on the underside, Merlin grabbed at Pendragon's golden hair for support. 

"Sorry," came the reply, warm on his cock as it slipped from his mouth. "I'll try and be careful." 

"Jesus," Merlin said when Pendragon went right back to licking and sucking his dick. It was absolutely apparent that he had never done this before. The thought that Merlin's dick was the first to be in the wet heaven of Pendragon's mouth, was enough to get him moaning. He hadn't realized he was still clutching at Pendragon's hair until he used it to steer Pendragon's tongue closer to his balls. 

He unclenched his fingers. Apologizing by running his hands through the length of Pendragon's hair. It was just as soft as it looked. 

"Use your hands," Merlin said, voice like sandpaper. "So you don't choke." 

Merlin tried to take it all in, memorize the look and feel of Arthur Pendragon with a fat dick in his mouth: the rough callous of his fingers as they rubbed up from the base and grabbed roughly at his balls; the inexperienced greed in his mouth, so wet that he dripped drool down his chin; the gape of his pink lips, stretched; the sloppy sounds that came with each suckling suck—

Merlin yelped a little, feeling the clumsy push of a finger behind his balls, nudging to his hole. Pendragon pulled away quickly, placing open mouthed kisses to the tip of his dick like he was apologizing. 

"Sorry," he said with a voice hoarse from dick. "I thought - I like it like that," he paused, tongue licking out to chase a drop of pre-come from the tip. 

His eyes flickered up. "Sorry. I thought, sometimes I can get three—"

Merlin didn't mean to shove his cock back in Pendragon's mouth, but that's what happened. He moaned, muttering "fuck, fuck yes" and possibly something more embarrassing like "you gorgeous thing, your mouth" but Merlin was ignoring that. It was hard not to when Pendragon's eyes had slipped closed again as his mouth returned to being stuffed full of dick and man, Merlin didn't know if his mind had been addled with lust but Pendragon looked like he was enjoying this too much for a straight guy. 

Well that, and the fact that apparently Merlin was going to have to try and continue living a normal life with the knowledge that ArthurfuckingPendragon liked to stick his fingers up his ass. 

Finger _s_.

That's plural. 

More than one finger. Up that gorgeous, toned and honestly, fucking _plump_ ass. 

"Fuck, yes, oh god, yes," Merlin babbled. "Suck harder— _yes_ , just like that. Christ your tongue."

There were other thoughts, about how Arthur might need someone to press chapstick to the corners of his mouth so they wouldn't crack; how Merlin would love to teach him to hold his breath longer; how soft his hair was against Merlin's fingers; how his eyes blinked open every couple of strokes and they looked haunted with arousal but not with disgust or fear or anger; how hot his cheeks were underneath Merlin's wandering hands; how Merlin desperately wanted to take him inside, sit on the couch and make out with him until they both passed out. 

How, even in his most indulgent fantasies, Arthur Pendragon had never looked this frighteningly at home. 

On his knees. 

Merlin's dick—

"I'm going to come," Merlin cautioned, his hips jerking in time with Pendragon's mouth. "Oh fuck, I'm going to come in your mouth if you don't—" but blue eyes just stared right back at him and Merlin couldn't help it, couldn't help but trace the pulled mouth around his dick, as he moaned. He was so close. He was going to come. 

"Arthur, fuck!" 

Embarrassingly, he came just moments later with a strangled shout that was way too high-pitched for his dignity. But that didn't compare to watching Pendragon's eyes widen after the first jerk of Merlin's dick in his mouth or the way Merlin's heart almost stopped when he felt the flicker of Pendragon's tongue along his slit, as if he was coaxing the jizz out of Merlin's dick and directly onto his tongue. 

No sooner had Merlin panted out his last groan, dick weakly spurting the last of his sac, than Pendragon pulled off. Only, instead of getting up and running away, he pulled at Merlin's boxers until he exposed the sharp line of Merlin's hip. In a confused moment, Merlin stared out in post-coital bliss (or permanent brain damage from getting his sense sucked out his dick) but Pendragon just closed his eyes, latched his mouth onto Merlin's hip bone and sucked with a wide mouth and sharp teeth, hand stuffed down his own jeans. 

Merlin watched in shock as Pendragon sucked and sucked, tongue fluttering back and forth on his hipbone as he worked his cock for a few jerks. His teeth scraped up and down before the flat of his tongue returned with suction that Merlin remembered being particularly handy just moments ago when it came to blowjobs. Then Pendragon was coming with a gasp that sounded suspiciously like 'Merlin' against the killer hickey he just put on Merlin's skin. 

Merlin sat down on the bench. They were both panting, although Pendragon's chest was more impressive in the way his heaved to work the air into his lungs. Merlin tore his eyes away from the fan of Pendragon's lashes and the redness of his face. Merlin's cock was still out, slowly softening in his lap. Pendragon was still on his knees, hand awkwardly down his pants, with come and spit shining his lips and chin. 

Merlin stared. Pendragon's eyes opened. They were still that startling sort of blue. 

"I'll do your physics homework," Merlin said. 

"Yeah," Pendragon replied, voice an absolute mess. He nodded, throat working. Merlin had a crazy, dizzying thought of how Pendragon might taste, his mouth still coated with Merlin's come. 

They both looked down at Merlin's cock. 

It looked deceptively innocent. Kind of floppy or like a bunny peeking out of his burrow. 

He was going insane. 

Merlin looked up at Pendragon. He was still staring at Merlin's exposed crotch with something that looked like wonder, something akin to worship and the same hungry tainted gaze that made want and _pure insanity_ pool in Merlin's gut. Because insanity was the only reason why they were in this situation. 

"Yeah," Pendragon repeated. "Thanks, mate."

———

And that's how it began.

To be fair, not much changed. Merlin got up every day, fought Will for the shower and over who got the last of the Cinnamon Crunch and then caught a ride with Gwen and Lance to school. Merlin slept through most of his first period classes, smoked a joint in second and spent lunch outside. The run-ins with meat-heads like Valiant didn't stop. 

Neither did Arthur's interference. 

He still charged in, unwelcome, and Merlin still glared. He tried to be as brutal and to the point as he was before—to compartmentalize the world that Arthur Pendragon lived in and the world that Merlin occupied. 

But it was harder to ignore Arthur now—almost because Merlin couldn't call him Pendragon anymore, not with him coming around every Sunday night when Merlin's mom was working her last shift of the week at the hospital. It would have been easier if all he did was come pick up his homework and then suck Merlin's cock. But he didn't do that. That would have been too easy. Instead, he came in and poked at Merlin's stuff, murmuring in that stupid accent of his that made even his teasing over Merlin's Mathletes trophies sound like soft-core pornography. He would walk around Merlin's house and if Will was around, make awkward small talk until Merlin would have to physically drag Arthur up the stairs and into his bedroom. Even then, after Merlin handed the school work over, Arthur would mill about and ask to play Call of Duty and just generally drive Merlin mad with wanting to know all these _things_ about Merlin. The worst thing was, when Merlin refused to talk, Arthur just stayed longer and filled up the silence with his own chatter. 

Terrifyingly, Merlin was becoming an expert in the life and feelings of Arthur Pendragon.

Then, after Merlin was throughly distracted by how normal everything was between him and Arthur—like they were friends, he'd realize that Arthur was pawing at his jeans or crawling up the bed to throw the Xbox controller on the ground so that he could get to Merlin's cock. 

It was... possibly the best thing that ever happened to him. 

School was a bit awkward, only because Arthur was still Arthur and Merlin was, well he was still the awkward gay kid. And to top it all off, Gwaine had stopped coming around for anything more than to talk. He said it was because he was seeing someone and that he couldn't be fooling around with Merlin, no matter how nice his dick was. Merlin had been okay with that, until the rumor mill didn't pick up about Gwaine with anyone and after some careful asking around, there was a general consensus that Gwaine was physically incapable of monogamy. When Merlin pressed Gwaine about it, he was his general fuck-off self. 

"Aww, Merlin, do you miss me?" or "Aww, I know Pendragon isn't as good as me." 

The second one only confirmed his suspicion that Arthur had told Gwaine. He wasn't sure if he wanted to think about that conversation. Some days, when he thought about it, he thought they might just share stories about how a fag like Merlin was so easily manipulated into doing their homework. Other days, it involved Arthur and Gwaine fighting over his gloriously tasty cock and ended in both of them having a really hot jerk-off session in the locker-room showers. 

It didn't matter anyway. 

It did but not really because if Merlin was being honest with himself, which was rare, he much preferred Arthur on his knees. There was something special, and Merlin acknowledged that he was being naïve, but there was something special about Arthur Pendragon on his knees for Merlin. As far as Merlin knew, Arthur was as chaste as purely fallen snow. Vivian and Sophie (perky breasted but empty headed cheerleaders) had both dated him for three months and the most they got out of him was one drunken fingering (amazing because hello, those thick fingers would look delicious stuffed—anyway) and goodnight kisses under porch lamps that eventually, after enthusiastic encouragement, led to steamy make-out sessions. 

Basically, the person who weekly got on his knees and looked _starved_ , greedily putting his mouth onto Merlin's dick in any and all the ways that were physically possible didn't match any description of the boyfriend Vivian and Sophie had. 

Apparently, homosexual-for-homework Arthur was some sort of pod person. 

Merlin was having a hard time feeling aggrieved.

He was, however, very upset about the fact that Arthur always came in his pants. 

What the hell was up with that? 

Luckily for him, Arthur was about to solve that problem. Never the easy way, because Arthur Pendragon might have been easy on the eyes and certainly easy enough to get on his knees for Merlin—he wasn't the sort of person who did things the easy way.

———

March melted into April. Whatever sort of sun Ealdor was enjoying in March was chased away by the hellion of weather April brought. Mornings promised heat but then launched immediately into thunder clouds that shook the walls and made the electricity flicker. Not that Merlin minded, he loved thunder storms but the bad weather made the jocks of the school particularly unruly. Apparently, exerting their manliness was impossible to do without aid of the outdoors.

A week into April, Merlin was prepared to kill someone. 

"Oh for fuck's sake," Merlin said, slamming his locker and putting the ice pack back on his eye. "If the swelling doesn't go down, I'm going to hack into every single one of their records and fail them back to middle-school." 

Gwen tutted. "Keep the ice on it." 

"My arm is tired," he whined, leaning against his locker and pouting at her. "I don't want to go to class. I want to go get high and forget that I live in a place where getting punched in the face is simply a consequence of rain. Rain, Gwen!" 

Will came round the corner and burst into laughter. 

"Will, it's not funny," Gwen chastened. But Will kept laughing, coming over to clap Merlin on the back. 

"What the fuck happened to your face?" 

Merlin scowled. "Edwin failed his biology exam and blamed his inability to understand the basic functions of reproduction on my face." 

"Edwin?" 

"Three out of the four baseball games have rained out," Merlin said by way of explanation. "It's as if none of them have jacked off in as many days. They're all keyed up. Valiant started a fight with Gwaine over a broken pencil yesterday. I'm just a casualty of testosterone fuelled rage." 

Will made a face that said, _we both know one guy is getting some on the team_ but since Gwen was still in the dark about Merlin fostering a small prostitution ring in exchange for homework help, he thankfully kept his mouth shut. 

"Are you ditching?" 

Will shrugged. Merlin nodded, "I need weed or at least a painkiller. I bet that weird kid from O Chem has one." 

They both waved as Gwen rolled her eyes and walked to her free period, where she helped raise money for starving kids in a third world country. Gwen was a far superior person than Merlin. He could admit that. 

"Let's go get high," Merlin said, walking along the hallway toward the doors that would lead them outside into the rain but closer to a small shed out that used to hold equipment and now shielded Merlin and Will when they needed a dry place to skip school. 

Everything was going according to plan when they were accosted in the hallway by Arthur. 

Well. Will wasn't really accosted. It was mostly just Merlin.

"I need to speak with you," Arthur said, voice low and eyes very serious. 

Merlin looked down at his arm, where Arthur was gripping it firmly. "What." 

"I need to speak with you. It can't wait, I apologize," he said, the last part directed to Will, before he tugged Merlin down in a different direction, before he had a chance to protest. 

Also, his eye hurt. 

"It's fine," Will was shouting. "I'm totally fine by myself, you whore-mongering facists!" 

Merlin was trying to sort out the fact that Arthur was a) skipping class, b) _touching Merlin_ during _school hours_ , c) well, honestly, he was still hung up on b, however, he was also being dragged into a janitor's closet. 

"What is your problem?" Merlin shouted but Arthur was already hushing him, turning on the light and grabbing Merlin's face to examine his black-eye. 

"Does it hurt?" 

Merlin batted at his hands, which were _poking_ him in the eye thank you very much, but Arthur kept pressing and tilting until Merlin leaned into the light. 

"Are you kidding me? Did you seriously drag me into a janitor's closet to take a look at the shiner I got?" Unfortunately, Merlin didn't sound annoyed (he was). Instead, he sounded a bit smitten and soft (he wasn't). 

Arthur continued to poke. "Have you been keeping ice on it? It doesn't look like your other eye will bruise but the swelling is something awful." 

"It's fine," Merlin said, feeling something soft and completely unrecognisable settle in the pit of his belly. "Arthur, I'm fine." 

That drew Arthur's attention away from his eye, but his fingers didn't stop their tender exploration. In fact, they more or less stroked across his cheekbone and then up to his eyebrow in a near hypnotic motion. 

Christ, he smelled fantastic. 

"Why'd you pick a fight with Edwin?" 

Merlin huffed. "I didn't. He was in a shit mood and I was the nearest available punching bag." 

Arthur frowned. "I'm going to make him pay," he said softly. "You look awful." 

"It's not going to affect my ability to do your homework, if that's what you're worried about," Merlin said, now squirming under the strange expression on Arthur's face. "I'll be able to—"

"Can I kiss you?" 

Merlin stared. He didn't know anyone in the world who looked as attractive as Arthur did, back lit by the florescent light and his brow furrowed as if concentrating very hard on something. 

Or someone. 

"What?" 

Arthur stepped closer, until Merlin was pressed against one of the walls. Logically, he knew that there was probably a mop or a broom within five feet of his person but that didn't stop him from being incredibly turned on. Which was strange, because he'd never given kissing Arthur any thought. Sure, his lips looked incredibly soft and when they were stretched on the width of his cock, Merlin thought about smearing them with lipbalm until all the cracks were soothed but... he hadn't really thought about _kissing_ Arthur. 

That was probably something prostitutes for homework didn't engage in. 

It was something boyfriends did. 

They weren't boyfriends. 

"I just - I would really like to kiss you," Arthur replied, his fingers still stroking Merlin's face. "May I?" 

Maybe it was Arthur's correct grammar. Maybe it was the face wound leaking into his brain. Maybe it was because Arthur was the strangest, most beautiful man Merlin had ever encountered. Maybe it was because his crush on Arthur was the size of the Titanic and bitch, he was going down with that ship—no matter how unrealistic it all was to be spending anytime with someone who was, for all intents and purposes, way out of Merlin's league. It could have been anything that made Merlin say yes to Arthur. (Merlin was betting on the smell of him. Maybe Will's hypnosis theory was right, it was the hair _and_ the smell of him, clean sweat and grass and expensive cologne—a tag team of sexy hypnosis.) 

But it certainly wasn't because Merlin particularly desired to be kissed. 

"Yeah," Merlin breathed out but Arthur was already there, his other hand slipping down to cup his hip. Merlin could feel the steady swipe of Arthur's thumb against his hipbone. 

It was not the kiss that Merlin expected. 

Arthur's lips were soft against Merlin's chapped ones. (He had a tendency to chew them.) He just pressed, firm and steady for a few seconds before leaning back for a minute and then ducking in again. It was another soft press, cradling Merlin's upper lip and then his bottom lip. The little kisses seemed to pile up, building to some sort of invisible threshold. Merlin had expected sloppy and desperate, just like the way Arthur pawed at his cock until the slick head was pressing between his lips and his slit was leaking all over Arthur's tongue. 

This... this was nothing like that. These kisses, they were Mr. Darcy and Ms. Elizabeth kisses on a fucking walk in broad daylight. They were chaste and soft and _tender_. 

It was most likely the head injury, but the way Arthur kept pressing the kisses to the corners of Merlin's mouth and licking at the bottom of his lip, not seeking entrance but simply tasting him or soothing him—it was a heady combination. Merlin's knees felt weak and his heart sped up, the evidence of his arousal still heavy between his legs but the frantic _come before you die, dear god_ feeling was gone. In its place was some sort of languid arousal, like he could do this all day. 

"I am sorry about your eye," Arthur said, pulling far enough away to speak but not really far enough for Merlin to focus on his face. When his lips moved, the brushed up against Merlin's.

"Wasn't your fault." 

Arthur hummed. 

Merlin was having all sorts of hazy feelings that he wasn't going to examine—he felt like he was trapped in some sort of Pendragon Trap (Bear Claw sold separately). He was quickly getting lost in his thoughts on how soft Arthur's hoodie was and how good he looked in red and very, very busy getting kissed by Arthur Pendragon's soft, pink mouth. 

That's when the door opened. 

"Mr. Gaius isn't buying the story," Morgana said, her entire body blocking the door. Merlin squeaked, pulling his mouth away from Arthur's and staring in shock. This was not good. This was when Merlin got beat up by Arthur because he now realized just _how gay_ it was to suck cock and make out in a janitor's closet with someone else who happened to have a dick. He was going to die and Morgana and her glorious breasts were going to be witness. 

His mom was going to be so upset. 

Arthur, the utter idiot, didn't back away. He didn't even let go of Merlin. He more or less shifted to put himself between Morgana and Merlin, but didn't stop with the touching. Merlin was torn between staring at Morgana (her hair was also really shiny) and controlling the buck of his hips as Arthur was still moving his thumb back and forth on the strip of skin by his hip, where his t-shirt had ridden up. 

Merlin was riding a really weird line of _what the fuck_ about even being in a situation where he would be kissing Arthur Pendragon, but because of Morgana, he then was thinking about Arthur having Morgana's breasts and Arthur's soft mouth and fuck, his head hurt. 

"Jesus, Morgana," Arthur was saying. "Can you give us one moment?" 

Morgana smirked. "Just a moment? Oh, Arthur, you sure know how to treat a girl—" 

"Will you shut the damn door?"

She slammed it with a smile. 

"I need to return to class," Arthur said but Merlin's previous thoughts were delayed because Arthur wasted no time in bringing their mouths back together. 

By the time Arthur (finally) left, Merlin had to spend twenty minutes talking down his erection because his dick refused to believe contact with Arthur's lips didn't automatically result in orgasms (and Merlin _was not_ jerking off in a cleaning supply closet—the metaphor alone did his head in). When the bell for first lunch rang and Merlin shuffled out of the closet and into the steady flow of people in the hallway, he had convinced himself that all this kissing business was just an elaborate hallucination of his head injury. 

He was just going to pretend it never happened.

———

Pretending it never happened turned out to just make Merlin pissed off.

To be fair, the swelling in his eye hadn't gone down and that wasn't really helping his mood either. But the bottom line was, he was uncomfortable and cranky. He had never been happier to write off the day, sullenly sitting through his third period class and glaring at anyone who so much as gave him a second glance. 

He skipped fourth period all together and walked home. 

The walk didn't clear his head, which sounded something like this:

 _Arthur's lips are really soft, fuck my eye hurts, Arthur's tongue is probably really pink, did Morgana tell anyone, I hope Edwin slips in the shower and drowns, Arthur's mouth around my cock is awesome, what size bra would Arthur would wear if he had titties, can you imagine living in the Pendragon house with those two if they both had breasts, damn my eye really fucking hurts, I want to kiss Arthur again, I bet his nipples are super slutty, is pus coming out of my eye or am I just spontaneously crying, if I want to make-out with Arthur Pendragon then I'm doomed, my eye is going to make Mom freak, I want to stuff my face in Arthur's back while I pound his ass, am I seriously thinking about giving Arthur a dicking, my eye is falling the fuck out, I should have waited for a ride because it's definitely going to rain on me, Arthur's ass looks like it wants to be bitten like a juicy peach, will rain make my black-eye infected, what kind of sounds would Arthur make if his mouth wasn't stuffed with cock, I bet he'd let me fist him, we should really make-out all the time, Mom is going to kill me—ow, my fucking face hurts._

He slammed every door when he got home and when Will pounded on his door to play Call of Duty sometime later, Merlin pretended like he was asleep.

———

His spectacularly shitty mood did not abate the next morning. His mother spent the whole of Saturday morning fussing over his eye, putting drops in it and making him ice it until it felt like the whole side of his face was frozen inside an iceberg. She threatened to call the ACLU like a million times (even though Edwin hitting him had nothing to do with Merlin's sexuality, that was an argument he was definitely going to lose), ranting about LGBTQ Bullying until she was blue in the face. Merlin eventually talked her down to just activating the PFLAG phone-tree to organize some sort of bake sale or quilting fair or something to raise awareness but that Merlin suspected his mom used as an excuse to incite rebellion and give her a reason to drink tequila.

Hunith Emrys was not a woman to be trifled with. 

Merlin suffered through the coddling with minimal noise. His terrible mood wasn't getting any better. He was just angry and bitchy, which was only soothed slightly by his mother's cookies and then the tacos she made for dinner before work. Merlin loved tacos. He loved them even better when he could see them properly. 

Will beat him twice at Call of Duty before he looked up from the floor and said, "Maybe you should just jerk off" and closed the door. 

"Maybe I will!" Merlin had yelled but he wasn't really angry at Will. Even he could admit that he was shit company right now. 

Too bad jerking off kind of gave him motion sickness and he ended up lying flat on his bed, dick angry and leaking, thinking about Arthur Pendragon and not being able to come for fear of vomiting all over himself. 

He took a painkiller and went to bed, not even bothering to tuck himself in.

———

Sunday appeared to be much of the same angst-ridden teenage saga that his life had become, until Gwaine showed up.

Merlin squinted at him from his bench in the backyard. 

"I pretty much hate you right now," Merlin said over the fence. "So, if you don't take off your shirt, I'm probably just going to go inside." 

Gwaine shrugged, then tugged his shirt off. The cool morning made his nipples hard and Merlin wasn't thinking about Gwaine anymore. Not at all. Which was unfair because Gwaine looked like a Calvin Klein model. Instead, he was thinking about Arthur's nipples and being pissed off and possibly a little upset, that he hadn't seen them—would never see them. 

"I hate you," Merlin said, trying to push away thoughts of nipples. "You've ruined my life." 

"Your eye looks better." 

Merlin glared. "It doesn’t. I feel like I'll never see again." 

"Queen, you need to calm down," Gwaine said, smiling. "Besides, you getting punched was not my fault." 

"Getting punched is the least of my problems." 

Gwaine smiled like he knew something but Merlin couldn't tell if that was just the way his teeth looked when he smiled or if he was being a smug cunt. Merlin longed for the days before Gwaine moved next door, or hell, he would settle for only having to think about Gwaine in the context of blowing his load. 

"Ah, you and Pendragon need marriage counseling?" 

"You know what? Fuck you, Gwaine. If it wasn't for you, my brain wouldn't be addled by Arthur Pendragon becoming my own live-action porn doll. Do you know how hard it is to live my life when Arthur swallows my come and makes out with me in janitor closets? Do you know, Gwaine? Hmm?"

Gwaine raised his eyebrows. "You need to chill." 

"I hate you." 

"Hey, don't be mad. I have a delicate stomach," Gwaine said seriously. "I didn't know if your semen was going to give me indigestion." 

Merlin narrowed his eye. "I would never let you give me head without a condom, I've no idea where you've been." 

Gwaine grinned. "Yeah, but Pendragon is totally a virgin, so he can get all up on your—"

"He kissed me yesterday," Merlin blurted out. "He kissed me and I'm ninety-five percent sure I'm freaking out about this." 

Gwaine opened his mouth but shut it, his features twisting up like when he's trying to drag his virtual body out of firing range to self revive in Call of Duty. Merlin licked his lips. He had no idea why he said that. 

"It's practically May, dude." 

Okay, now Merlin was confused and would bet some serious money that he didn't look as attractive as Gwaine looked. Also, Merlin had less practice at being confused. 

"What does that have anything to do with it?" 

Gwaine threw his hands up in the hair. "You and Pendragon! You've been—you know, since the end of March, I figured you'd have been used to the kissing by now. What kind of gay are you? The kind that doesn't like kissing men? That's sounds like some seriously self-hating shit going on there, Merlin." 

"What? No! I like kissing just fine," Merlin shouted. "And just because Arthur wants to give me blowies—"

" _Blowies_?" 

"—doesn't mean he wants to kiss me! You didn't!" 

"Okay, yeah but I'm an asshole and we're not," Gwaine made a nondescript gesture with his hands. "But Pendragon, I mean he..." 

"He what?" Merlin said, feeling tired and frustrated and done. He was done. "He what, Gwaine? He doesn't mind getting his knees dirty as long as his physics homework gets done? Yeah. He doesn't." 

Merlin hated all of them. He hated every jock in the world, but he especially hated the ones like Gwaine and Arthur because if it wasn't for them, Merlin wouldn't know what it was like on the other side. He would have been happily compartmentalizing: jocks like Gwaine and Arthur, pretty and popular and heterosexual—they go over there and nerds like him, lanky and awkward and homosexual stayed out of sight. They didn't talk. They didn't become friends. They didn't do each other favors. They didn't have sex of any kind and they certainly didn't kiss. 

"But you and Pendragon—" 

"Leave it alone," Merlin said, getting up and stomping to the sliding glass doors. "I've got a headache. Thanks for nothing. If you see Arth—Pendragon," he said with a sneer, "tell him I'm done. I'm sure he can find some other faggot to do his homework for him." 

"Merlin!" Gwaine yelled after him but Merlin ignored him. 

He really was tired. 

He didn't spend his nap actually sleeping, more just staring at the ceiling and wishing he could set things (or people) on fire with his eyes. Somewhere in the pit of his traitorous stomach, he knew he was being a bit irrational. Maybe it was a bit crazy to think that trading homework for blowjobs was never going to get complicated or hurtful or just plain fucked, but it had worked with Gwaine. The truth of the matter was Merlin had gotten greedy. The thin line that Arthur Pendragon had been toeing at since he met Merlin and was _nice_ and _hurt_ , with those stupid blue eyes that blinked in confusion when he realized that Merlin and him played on opposite sides of the field—well, whatever line there was, Merlin had let Arthur cross it and now they were in trouble. 

Merlin didn't want to do homework for Arthur. He just wanted to graduate from this stupid school and go to college in some liberal city, where he could fuck everything that moved and not feel guilty. Maybe, in the distant future where his dick was in danger of breaking off from all the ass he was getting, he'd find 'the one' and they'd hold hands, possibly curl up on couches and have lazy afternoons with mutual orgasms, microwavable food and toe socks. They might be boyfriends and do things that people who care about each other do. But not like Pendragon and Merlin. The boys in those fantasies weren't like Pendragon or Gwaine, although there were a little more built than Merlin. In his mind, he knew there were jocks that liked cock—he watched enough porn to be sure of the physical evidence, if you will—but here, in Merlin's life, he couldn't get over it. 

Arthur Pendragon felt a world away, even when he was on his knees right in front of Merlin. 

That was how it was always going to be. Arthur was out of his league and Merlin, well, he was stupid enough to get caught up. No use dwelling on realities that had no chance of straying into even the most distant fantasies Merlin had ever had. 

This thing with Pendragon had been a pipe dream and now it was time to get out, before there was any more kissing. Because the kissing, that's what had set this whole thing off and he didn't want to do that—it felt an awful lot like lying. 

"Wanna play COD?" Will said, popping his head into the door. 

Merlin glared at the ceiling. "Not really." 

"If I make nachos will you eat?" 

Merlin sat up a little. "Are you bribing me into happiness with food?"

"Will eating your feelings make you less of a bastard?" 

"Past experience says no," Merlin replied with a smile. "But I'll let you choose the music on the way to school tomorrow." 

Will rolled his eyes. "I'm still not convinced Edwin gave you that black eye. You probably got it from jerkin' so hard that you hit yourself in the eye with your elbow. Those things look like they could murder someone if you hit them right." 

"Are you making nachos?"

"I'm going! I'm going!" Will shouted, but he was smiling.

———

Merlin stepped out of the shower and poked at his eye in the mirror. The swelling had almost completely vanished over the past two days. His eye was still puffy but he could see out of it. Not that sight made it any better, the bruising was pretty colorful and the edging was going a bit green, which really highlighted the deep purple of it all.

"Attractive," he said to his reflection. 

He brushed his teeth and flossed, before stuffing his clothes in the laundry hamper and waddling his way across the hall in his towel. He still had a couple hours before he could respectably go to bed without looking like a geriatric case but taking a shower after eating his weight in nachos seemed like the best thing to do at the time. Even if his stomach looked as if he was in his second trimester. Food babies were the best. 

Merlin hitched the towel further up his hips and crossed the hallway to his room. 

Where he found Arthur Pendragon sitting on his bed. 

"What the hell are you doing here?" 

He looked good. God, did he. He was wearing his red and blue letterman's jacket that he got for lettering as a captain of a sports team. But it was unbuttoned, revealing a too-tight white v-neck that suddenly made Merlin's mouth dry. The jeans he wore weren't tight, but they clung to his thighs when he stood up. 

Merlin slammed the door. 

"What the fuck, Pendragon?" 

Merlin absolutely hated the furrow of Arthur's brow. It was so adorable and just the sight of it made Merlin want to suffocate him with a pillow or sit on his chest and jack off all over his face. This was what made him a crazy person. Arthur. These were the thoughts of people who were mentally unhinged. 

"Sorry," he said, hands going into his pockets. "Will let me in." 

Merlin narrowed his eyes. He really wished he was wearing clothes. "Yeah, well you can see yourself out," he said with as much coldness as he could. 

"What? Why?" 

"Seriously, Arthur—"

"I thought we could go to the movies or something," Arthur said quickly, running over Merlin's words. "Every time I'm here we just play COD and mess around, I thought maybe we should change it up a bit." 

Merlin gaped at him. 

Arthur smiled, just enough to show his teeth but there was a nervousness about it that conveyed something like hope or tenderness. Merlin blinked and remembered that he was angry. Right. 

"I'm not in the mood," Merlin found himself saying. "Just take your homework and go." 

"Why are you being like this?" 

Merlin threw up his hands, only to remember that he was wearing a towel and had to clutch it to his hips. He glared when Arthur's eyes automatically went to where his hands were. Arthur clearly had some sort of obsession with hips. Maybe he spent his time wishing they were rounder—ladier hips. Merlin didn't know but it definitely pissed him off. 

"Being like _what_?" Merlin was aware that he snarled the words out but he was practically naked and his head hurt and Arthur Pendragon was in his room, asking him on a date? What the hell. 

"You're being a dick," Arthur said. "I haven't seen you since Friday and—"

"Can you just take your fucking homework and leave?" 

Whatever tentative expression Arthur had was replaced by anger. This was something Merlin could deal with. Angry jocks? Piece of cake.

"No I won't just leave! What is wrong with you?" 

Merlin stayed silent, he'd never seen Arthur angry before but his cheeks flushed and his eyes flashed with a determination that Merlin thought opposing teams of Ealdor were probably terrified of. The way the muscles in his jaw clenched reminded him of other times Merlin had seen Arthur flushed. Now he was hard. Great. 

"Nothing is wrong with me," Merlin ground out, turning to his closet and trying to block out all the awful tightness in his chest. "Will you take your damn homework and get the fuck out of my room?" 

"Fuck you, Merlin," Arthur said, low and hurt. Merlin closed his eyes and breathed. "Is this about Friday? Because I'm sorry I left you, but Morgana can be a real bitch and she was already doing me a favor." 

Merlin shook his head. This was so fucking stupid. 

"Is this about Gwaine?" Arthur said, voice laced with something a bit more malicious. "He was asking about you yesterday. Are you two—I mean, you two aren't, right? Because he said—"

"I'm not fucking Gwaine," he growled out, suddenly feeling like he was going to cry. This was a nightmare. What the hell was wrong with him? "Jesus, Arthur, would you just go?" 

"No, I won't! You're being a prick and I don't—"

"Take your homework and go!"

"I don't want the fucking homework," Arthur roared and Merlin whipped around, holding desperately to his towel, to see Arthur throwing off his jacket. He was red in the face and Merlin felt ugly inside. 

"Don't throw a tantrum, you righteous asshole," Merlin said, clenching his fists. "If you didn't waste all your time talking to Gwaine about sucking my dick, then maybe you'd know that I don't want to do your homework for you anymore. Just take it and leave!" 

Arthur visibly fumed. "You are a fucking twat! I don't need the bloody homework! I just—You are such a dick! How can you possibly be this stupid!"

"I'm stupid?" Merlin bristled, laughing a bit at the cruelty of the situation. "You're the one taking homework—"

Arthur threw up his hands, one dropping to his hair. "I don't use it, other than to check my work. I'm getting straight A's you—you are the most infuriating!" He took a few breaths and paced the floor a bit. Merlin gaped. He _knew it_! He knew that Arthur didn't need the grades.

"So what," Merlin said, his own fury curling up in his throat and making it hard to breathe, hard to swallow down the embarrassment. "You just heard that it might be nice, from Gwaine, to experiment with the fag? See what it was like? What, Pendragon? Why the fuck are you here?"

Merlin stepped forward, watching Arthur pace with tiny frustrated strides. His room wasn't that big and half the floor was covered with clothes and notebooks. He stood right in Arthur's path and when he stopped, Merlin shoved him a bit in the shoulder. 

"Why the fuck are you here?"

"Because I like you!" Arthur bellowed, right in Merlin's face, who blinked and couldn't seem to look away from the blotchy redness of Arthur's face or the way that they were close enough that Merlin could smell him. "I fucking fancy you, yeah? And you, I don't know if you noticed it, but you're my damn boyfriend, Merlin! For fuck's sake."

Merlin gaped. Arthur had clamped his jaw shut, like he hadn't meant to let that all out—like it had escaped him. Except, the sentiment didn't make Merlin feel any better, in fact, it just made him angrier. 

"How could I be your boyfriend!" Merlin heard himself yell back. "I haven't even seen your cock!" 

"You know what?" Arthur snarled. "Fine."

"Fine!" Merlin yelled back but then made some sort of strangled noise in the back of his throat when Arthur stepped back, yanked the fly of his jeans down and whipped out his cock. It was half-hard, just the sight of it reminding Merlin that he was also aroused and pressing against the front of his towel. Except, all Merlin could do was stare: Arthur Pendragon's uncut, beautifully thick and jutting out of the slit in his boxers and just begging to be touched. 

That's when Will barged in.

"Is everything okay—OH MY GOD. MY EYES," he wailed, closing his eyes and throwing a hand over them as well as he wildly back out of the room.

"Shit," Arthur said and Merlin watched with horror as Will tried to back out of the room without opening his eyes and Arthur attempted to stuff his _still_ hard cock back into his boxers.

"Will!" Merlin shouted but Will was already slamming the door. "I'm going out and never, never coming back until you text me. I will never recover. Never!"

All the tension that had been building, whatever strange volcano of sheer stupidity felt like it had been capped, swallowed by Will's outburst. 

Merlin honestly felt like he was going to cry. 

"I'm just going to go," Arthur said, his voice strained and Merlin blinked away wetness, trying to focus on Arthur's downturned face. "I'm sorry for the confusion and for—for wasting your time. I apologize." 

Arthur couldn't even look and him and this, this sucked. This was shit. Fuck. 

"Wait, why—but," Merlin said, so fucking tired. "I don't understand."

Arthur hadn't really moved, just shifted toward the door. Merlin wondered if he was thinking about making a break for it without stopping to grab his jacket. He thought about how if he were to wear it, just to give it back on Monday, it would drape so heavy and ill-fitting on his slim shoulders. Not like Arthur's. 

"Will you just explain," Merlin whispered, hating the whimpered sound of his own voice. "Because all this shouting is making my head hurt and I'm no closer to understand what the hell is going on."

There was a great big pause, like Arthur was going to walk and leave Merlin with his stupid tears and whatever that horrible feeling in his chest was. Merlin looked at his shoes and tried to blink away the tears. When he looked up, Arthur was still there but his face was turned away—like he couldn't bear to see Merlin's crying face. 

It made Merlin feel like crying harder. 

God. Stupid.

"I don't need the homework," Arthur finally said. "My grades are fine. It's just—Gwaine knew you and I wanted to, I wanted to—I asked and he told me about what happened between the two of you with homework and the—"

Merlin cut him off before he could Arthur say _sexual favors_ because god, this whole thing was starting to make Merlin feel like that sleazy guy in all the films that got girls drunk, slept with them and then told them it was their fault. In fact, this whole thing was starting to feel like Pretty Woman, except Merlin was the shittest Richard Gere ever. 

"And you thought, what? I'll just trick him into liking me with my sex skills?" 

"No! I thought, that maybe if you didn't want to be—if you didn't like me for being me, because you can't say that you wanted to know me. Every time I tried, you were always so cold and I couldn't—you're always laughing with Will or Gwen and I just—I thought if you didn't like me like that, then maybe you'd like me for the sex. Or something. I don't know. I was being stupid and desperate and I apologized for hitting Gwaine—"

Merlin's brain hit some point of information overload like, for run on sentences before that and the only thing he could pick up on was, "You hit Gwaine?"

"I may have been... irrationally jealous," Arthur said, a little ruefully but when Merlin looked up, he wasn't smiling. He just looked sad. 

Merlin felt like his chest had been cracked open. So, Arthur Pendragon wasn't just homo for homework. He was... standing in Merlin's room, arguing with him because he liked him.

"So you... liked me, before," Merlin said tentatively, trying to catch Arthur's eye.

Arthur looked like he had swallowed something sour. "Yes."

"And instead of just asking me out, like a normal person, you led me to believe you needed my help and let me exchange homework you didn't need for blowing me?"

"I guess," Arthur said, glaring. 

"But you want to date me," Merlin clarified. He was starting to feel a little hysterical. 

Arthur must have seen something in his face change because he stepped closer to Merlin and not toward the door.

"Dating would be nice," Arthur said, stopping in front of Merlin and his ridiculous towel. 

"Because you like me." Merlin was smiling now. Arthur Pendragon _liked_ him, as in, _like_ liked him. "You like me," he repeated, grinning up into Arthur's sheepish face. There was still a redness to it that wasn't really that attractive. But the frown between his eyebrows was lessening and the twist of his mouth looked more like the beginnings of a smile than a snarl. 

This was really happening. Merlin hitched up his towel again and couldn't help but repeat himself, "You _like_ me!"

"This is starting to get embarrassing," but he was smiling now, even if it was a bit tentative. He was always so serious and Merlin found himself feeling really, really happy. He reached up and touched the flush of Arthur's cheek with his hand. 

Arthur's eyes fluttered shut and he leaned into the touch, starved and glorious and yes, Merlin's hard on was totally back. _This_ , this longing for something that you might never understand or even hope to define, this was familiar territory. He stroked the contours of Arthur's cheek and watched with hitching breath as Arthur practically nuzzled his hand. 

"What about the liking to be fingered bit?" He blurted out. Yep. He was hysterical. But he couldn’t stop grinning and he was so hard and fuck it, in for a penny, yeah? 

Arthur opened his eyes and Merlin watched with rapt attention when he wet his lips and asked, "Pardon?"

"When we first, you said that you liked it—was that just an elaborate ruse for me to enjoy getting blowjobs by you, because a) that's fucking cruel and b) you under estimate how much I like getting head," Merlin teased.

"You're not making any fucking sense," Arthur said, frown back and a little frustrated, like he was trying to follow the conversation and just couldn't get a handle on the game. He shook his head, as if to clear the cobwebs. "Listen, yes, I do enjoy fingering myself when I jack off. Are you happy now? And what, are you trying to tell me that it wouldn't have matter who I was because as long as you're getting off in someone's mouth, then it's alright?"

"No!" Merlin exclaimed, accidentally smacking Arthur in the face a little. "That's not—definitely not what I mean," he settled on. He pursed his lips and tried to look serious, moving his fingers to stroke the flat line of Arthur's lips. "I want to focus on the fingering bit. And the kissing bit, in the janitor's closet."

Arthur's face sort of lit up, shy but a little cocky again, like he just couldn't help himself. Merlin didn't know if he was going to find that expression endearing or annoying in the future, right now, he just found it hot. Then again, he found the screaming and crying bit hot too. He was seventeen. 

"You like it when I kissed you?"

Merlin felt embarrassed. This teasing bit was much better when he was the one doing the mocking. His insides squirmed. "Can we just make out again?" 

"I don't make out with people who aren't my boyfriend," Arthur said, stepping closer and ha! There is was, the steady magnetism that brought Arthur's broad hand to the dip in Merlin's hip. He tugged until Merlin's own hand was smashed between their bodies at a truly awkward angle. "So, Merlin, want to make out?" 

"We're going to have to work on our communication skills."

Arthur scrunched up his face in such a fabulous way that Merlin found himself wondering if he ever wanted to see anything but Arthur being silly ever in his life. But that was ridiculous. 

"I think we're doing a right sight better now," he said, tugging until Merlin's hand was _most definitely_ in the way and he pulled it away. Their hips pressed together and Merlin couldn't help letting out a groan when his towel made a small bid for escape. Luckily, his dick was there to save it from falling to the ground. 

"Well, if you say so." 

Arthur ground their hips together in a tight, hot circle that made Merlin a little dizzy. "I do," Arthur said, nudging Merlin's nose with his. "I can continue to be communicative." 

"Oh, can you?" 

Arthur's response was swallowed up when the space between them disappeared into a kiss. This one wasn't like the janitor's closet, but then again, Merlin was starting to think that all the ways of kissing Arthur were going to be pretty fucking amazing. 

"Let me see you," Merlin said, then Arthur pulled away. They were both breathing hard. Merlin's lips were tingling and his teeth hurt because they kept getting in the way but fuck, he really didn't care. He wanted to spend so much time with Arthur's mouth... and chapstick. 

"Yeah," Arthur muttered. "Just..." 

But Merlin was already there, pushing and pulling until the white fabric of Arthur's tee was up and off of him. Oh god, there they were, the infamous nipples that practically haunted Merlin's dreams. They were... they were really perky. Flat and perfect for Merlin's mouth. 

"I want," Merlin gasped, fingers trailing down to play with Arthur's flat nipple. "Can I suck on your tits?" 

"I guess?" 

He sounded unsure and weird and Merlin squirmed. "Is that weird?" He asked, fingers rolling the peaks until Arthur kind of gasped. 

"Yeah," Arthur said. "But good weird? That feels—"

"Lay down," Merlin said, pushing. Arthur landed with a thud, but at least he was padded by Merlin's dirty clothes. "Can I—your nipples, I mean, I want to suck on them. Badly." 

Arthur laughed but he kissed Merlin once, pulling him on top of him and then pushed his head down. Merlin licked his lips. 

"I'm kind of obsessed with them," Merlin whispered. 

Whatever reply Arthur would have had disappeared when Merlin sucked the peak into his mouth. It was _so soft_ , the peak was pebbled and felt amazing when Merlin flicked his tongue over the top of it. 

"God, that's so strange," Arthur gasped. 

Merlin pulled off with a pop. "Bad strange?" 

"No," Arthur said, tugging his head back down. "No, good strange. I've just never, you know, by myself." 

Merlin grinned. "You've fingered yourself—extensively—but you've never played with your nipples." 

Arthur shrugged, then grinned. "Your towel fell down." 

It was true, somewhere in the maneuverings down to the floor, Merlin's towel had fallen away. He grinned. It felt weird to be naked in front of anyone else but Merlin liked it. He felt really giddy, like relieved and excited and—"Take off your jeans," he said. 

He turned away, not really prepared to see Arthur shimmying on the ground with his nipples out. Because that—well, that might kill him. Instead, he crawled over and looked for his lube. It wasn't the best but it was all he had. If he could just find the damn bottle. (It was hiding underneath a stray sock, three giant dust-bunnies and a used condom, left over from Gwaine’s days. Ew.)

When he got back to Arthur, he was naked and flushing. His face was a blotchy red, like the way Merlin's got when he cried. 

"Are you o—" Merlin stopped. His eyes drawn to Arthur's dick. "Holy fuck." 

"What? What? Are you—"

Merlin crawled closer. He couldn't stop staring at it. He'd never really seen a dick like this, well, one that wasn't his own, hard and in the light. His past hook-ups had been fumblings in the dark. Nothing, nothing like looking Arthur—

"You don't like it," Arthur said, voice flat. "You—"

Merlin scrambled over and practically sat on him. "No! I like it! I love it, Arthur, Jesus," Merlin said, panicked that Arthur might try and scramble away. "It's just, this is the first time I've seen you—give me an adjustment period." 

Arthur laughed. "I guess I've seen yours." 

"Arthur, your mouth and my cock are like besties," Merlin said with a smirk when Arthur licked his lips and they both stared down at their crotches. 

Merlin couldn't stop staring at the uncut head of Arthur's cock. He was definitely smaller than Merlin, noticeably, but what it lacked in length it made up in sheer, unbelievable girth. Merlin had never seen a dick that thick. It was so... fat and thick and Merlin didn't even know if he could get his mouth around it. 

"Can I blow you?" Merlin said, still staring at the way it bobbed against Arthur's stomach. It was heavy and leaned on his stomach. Oh god, it was so _wide_. 

"Yeah," Arthur gasped, "but will you—with your fingers?" 

Merlin's brain short-circuited. "You want me to finger-fuck you?" 

"Is that okay?" Arthur sounded embarrassed and unsure and Merlin hated himself immediately. 

"It’s so more than okay," he said, leaning down to kiss Arthur's soft mouth. "I've basically been jacking to the thought of putting my fingers in your ass since you said something that first time." 

"Really?" 

Merlin nodded, fingers straying to Arthur's nipples again. "Yeah, I mean, Jesus Arthur, look at you," Merlin said, when Arthur moved and let his legs drop open for Merlin to lean between. "Is it—do you—"

Arthur grinned, shy but still that same sort of cocky that always infuriated and turned Merlin on. "You have no idea," he said.

"Oh my god," Merlin said, scrambling to get the lube. He wanted to be everywhere at once. Hell, he want to spontaneously grow more hands so he could have more fingers to touch Arthur with. Once he secured the lube closer to their bodies, he pushed back until he could see the whole of Arthur's nakedness. There was a trail of dark blond hair that led straight to his—oh it was so deliciously, yeah meaty, it was definitely meaty—dick, there was hair there too and Merlin scratched his fingernails through it. 

Arthur gasped. "Your fingers, oh!" 

His fingers pumped idly at Arthur's cock, watching as he thrust into Merlin's hand and gasped. He had foreskin and Merlin played with that, sticking his pinkie in the little slit until Arthur hissed. 

"What the fuck," but he didn't sound upset, just embarrassed. 

Merlin grinned up at him. "You're uncut." 

"Yeah." 

"Your dick is so fucking fat," Merlin said with glee. "I'm going to put my fingers in your ass. Holy shit this is—" 

"Shut up, shut up and fucking do it, oh my _god_. What is wrong with you!" Arthur hissed but Merlin was already moving down to coat his fingers with lube. 

He spilled the lube a little on Arthur's hip but managed to coat his finger and not get too distracted by Arthur's balls. 

Balls were great but Arthur's—Merlin had a feeling this was going to be like the nipples or the titty thing. 

When Merlin's finger circled Arthur's hole, it wasn't Merlin who pushed in but Arthur. He angled and pushed and Merlin just stared, a little in shock and afraid he might just spontaneously jizz over _everything_ because, "Holy fucking shit that is the hottest thing ever." 

Arthur just moaned. 

Merlin wiggled until his middle finger was fully seated. "You feel... so smooth." 

"Move," Arthur said. "Fuck me." 

He didn't need telling more than once. Merlin worked his finger in and out, watching as Arthur pushed back and rode the digit as best as he could from his position lying down. It was better than any porno Merlin had ever seen. 

"Is this—Arthur," Merlin gasped out but Arthur just smiled at him, a little breathless and Merlin gaped at him. "Can I—another one?" 

Arthur nodded and Merlin pushed a second finger in. This time, Arthur moaned loudly and his fat cock bounced hard against his abs. 

"Arthur, this is the hottest thing that's ever happened to me," Merlin said in awe. "Your ass, oh god, I'm fucking your ass with my fingers." 

Arthur grinned, moaning when Merlin jerked his hand back in a little harder. "I know," he said with a smile. "Isn't it great?" 

Merlin let himself go, pumping into Arthur until they were both moaning and Arthur was grabbing his wrist and angling him until he hit his prostate. 

"There?" Merlin asked, when Arthur shouted and scrunched up his face. Arthur nodded.

"Yeah, there—fuck, not too hard," Arthur said, but his ass was literally grabbing at Merlin's fingers and clenching and if Merlin thought too hard about his dick going _inside there_ he was going to hyperventilate _and die_.

"Better?" 

Arthur moaned. "Harder, give it to me—just, there!" 

Merlin scrambled to comply. Soon, Arthur was making these little 'ah-ah' noises that sounded like they were being punched out from his gut. And his dick, oh lord, his fat little dick was leaking all over his stomach. Merlin was going to write odes to that dick—motherfucking haiku that all involve the word ‘meaty’ and emoticons. 

"You love this," Merlin said. "You—"

"Merlin," he moaned, sweating and thrashing on Merlin's floor. "That's—that's so fucking marvelous." 

A giggle escaped Merlin, because who used words like 'marvelous' while being fingered within an inch of their life? Arthur did. So Merlin kissed his knee. 

"Hey," Arthur said and Merlin realized that he had been in some sort of daze, just watching his fingers twist and glide into Arthur's tight ass. 

"Sorry, yeah?" 

Arthur looked shy all of three seconds before he licked his lips and said, "May I have another?" 

"You—absolutely," Merlin rushed out. "More lube, we need more lube and fuck, Arthur, your _ass_." 

Arthur laughed, all sexy and breathless and a little manic. Merlin was quickly becoming addicted to it. 

Merlin watched in amazement as three of his fingers sunk into Arthur's perfect ass. "Oh my god," Merlin breathed, digging his teeth into the flesh of Arthur's inner thigh. The skin was so incredibly soft there. "You're like some sort of bottoming savant." 

" _Mer_ lin," he growled. Merlin jerked his eyes up from where his fingers were sitting, second knuckles snug and tucked up against Arthur's ass. "Move, fuck, _move_." 

"Right," Merlin breathed, pulling his fingers back until only his middle one was sitting in the cradle of Arthur's hole. There was lube everywhere and his fingers were wet from being inside of Arthur—seriously so hot—but nothing compared to watching Arthur's back bow, his hips shimmying back to search for the press of Merlin's fingers. "I'm right here," he said and Arthur nodded, moaning when the fingers sunk back in. 

"Is it good?" He asked because, right, they were communicating. 

"Yeah, yeah, just—" but whatever Arthur was going to say was lost when Merlin wiggled his fingers on the next thrust and Arthur made a strangled shout noise in his throat. Merlin almost pulled out, worried he had hurt him but then Arthur was shaking his head and reaching down to push Merlin's finger's deeper. 

"Again, there, whatever—fuck, yeah," Arthur keened, breathy and absolutely _slutty_ with need. "Just, oh fuck, that's it. Right there." 

Merlin kept a steady rhythm, as much as he could with his hands shaking and his cock demanding to be touched _right the fuck now_ , until Arthur was squirming and sort of thrashing on Merlin's fingers, while his dick bounced on his perfect sculpted abs. This fatmeatywide dick bouncing thing was obviously going to be a distraction. Like the nipples. Merlin was doomed and it was so. fucking. awesome. 

Merlin sucked a bruise on Arthur's thigh to keep him from making a fool out of himself by communicating a little too much—like how Arthur looked so fucking beautiful and _holy shit, remember when I dreamed about you with tits? This is a million times better_. 

"Merlin, that's—please," Arthur moaned. He looked feverish and twitchy, like he was torn between crying and coming. Merlin really liked that idea or maybe the idea of having Arthur like this, teetering on the edge of orgasm until he cried and came. Just the image of the wet slick of Arthur’s face, maybe with Merlin’s come too—come and tears and—Yeah. _Oh yeah_. 

"Can I," Merlin started, stopping to press his fingers in deep and keep them on that spot that had Arthur thrusting his hips in the air and generally humping the air like a maniac. Merlin was momentarily distracted (again) by the way Arthur's dick just sort of... flopped around, all hard and leaking and begging to be sucked on. He couldn’t wait any longer to have it on his tongue and to finally know what Arthur’s jizz tasted like, which might sound like a stalker thing to say but Merlin was past the point of justification. Arthur’s dick was just like his hair: mind-alteringly alluring. "Can I—" 

He felt shy suddenly, which made no fucking sense. He was three fingers deep in ArthurgoddamnPendragon and there weren't _any_ communication issues about how much they both wanted this in a big, big way. 

Arthur growled. "Merlin," he spat out like a curse, but Merlin just laved at the mark he was making on Arthur's thigh and reached his other hand up to play with Arthur's nipple. 

"I really love your nipples," Merlin blurted out. 

Arthur looked at him like he was insane. 

"I mean, I really, _really_ love your nipples," he repeated, twisting his fingers up and up until Arthur cursed and thrashed again. "I have weird day dreams about them," Merlin continued, mouth running away from him as he let go of Arthur's left nipple and reached down to spread Arthur's legs more open, even if they looked awkward in the air like that. He kissed further up, until he could tongue the soft, hairless juncture between Arthur's thigh and groin, where his balls were drawn up tight. 

Merlin really wanted to bite them. 

And that was weird. 

He kept that thought to himself. 

He nosed them instead, giving them a little nuzzle—a sneaky little cuddle—and rammed his fingers into Arthur's ass until the squelch of the lube and Arthur's choked little noise made him rut against the carpet. He slide out and then back in, harder this time, so that Arthur’s hips jolted up again and his toes curled into the carpet like he could gain leverage there. Merlin nosed at Arthur’s balls again, they were so _soft_ —did he lotion them?—and tried to thrust his fingers harder, watching the way pre-come spilt from Arthur’s dickhead and splashed onto his stomach. This seriously hard finger-blasting was really working out for both of them. Arthur got reamed and Merlin had an amazing view of the collections of fetishes he had gained for Arthur’s body parts. Also, _the bouncing_.

"Merlin, you've got to," Arthur gasped, pumping his hips in the air again. "You—please, fuck, will—"

Merlin smiled. He really wanted to give Arthur's balls a French kiss. Was that weird? Did other people think about tonguing someone else's balls? 

"Merlin!" 

He looked up. "Hmm?" Arthur looked wild. His face was red and sweaty. His hair was sticking up from where he had pushed it off his soaking forehead. Also, Merlin could make out the pink buds of Arthur's nipples and from this angle, they looked like castle turrets. 

"I really want your mouth," Arthur said, words hoarse and forced out of him. 

"What was that?" he replied teasingly, twisting his fingers again on the up stroke and making Arthur curse. "I'm not sure I heard you." 

"Your mouth—"

"My what?" 

Arthur slammed a hand down on the floor and his hips jumped in the air, grinding down on Merlin's fingers when he slid across that spot again. Merlin grinned and gave Arthur's balls a tiny lick. 

"What did you say, Arthur?" He breathed over the soft skin, where there was just a hint of hair. Merlin's balls were hairy, which was not really sexy, but Arthur's... they were oddly soft. Did he shave them?

"Suck my dick," Arthur yelled out. "Your mouth—fuck, suck my fucking dick." 

Merlin didn't even get to suck more than three times (which was enough to make his jaw hurt), barely having time to lave at the leaking tip and pathetically choke on Arthur's freakishly fat dick, before he was coming in a strangled gasp. Merlin thought Arthur might buck because Merlin always did, but Arthur was more concerned about grinding back onto Merlin's rapidly moving fingers as he shot his load on Merlin's tongue. 

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," Arthur was chanting, circling his hips and _still_ coming. 

Merlin moved down to lick his soft balls again, letting a few sluggish pulses of come run down Arthur's dick. But he made sure to lick and suck his way back up, playing with the foreskin until Arthur put a hand through his hair and tugged. 

"Enough, Jesus, that's enough," he panted out. Merlin pulled off with a slurp but kept his fingers moving slowly. 

Arthur was breathing hard, eye-lids wide open instead of hazy with orgasm. He looked a bit frantic, like he was late for school. 

"Are you okay?" Merlin asked, kind of afraid of the answer. 

Arthur laughed, head hitting the floor and Merlin surged up to press a kiss to his nipples. His fingers slipped out and Arthur hissed, "Fuck." 

"Did I hurt you?" 

"No," Arthur replied, pulling so that he could give Merlin a quick, sloppy kiss. "No. I don't believe you did, but I’ll probably be sore." 

"Awesome," Merlin said, grinning. Arthur gave him the same sort of ecstatic smile in return. Being sore from sex, with each other, that was—yeah, that was really cool.

Arthur was still breathing hard into Merlin's mouth as they made out, tongues loose and teeth getting in the way. Merlin pulled away, arching into the way Arthur's hand kept running up and down his back. 

"Arthur?" 

"Hmm?" he hummed but he seemed to be preoccupied with using his other hand to play with Merlin's ear. Maybe Arthur liked weird sex things too. Maybe they were perfect for each other. 

"I really, really need to come," Merlin whispered, like it was a secret. "Like, can we get some communication up in this bitch because—" 

Arthur laughed, straight into his mouth but he was smiling and it was great and fuck, Merlin was so fucking hard. His balls were getting ready to burst. Arthur stuck his tongue back into Merlin's mouth, still laughing a little with his broad chest heaving underneath Merlin's skinny one. 

"Yeah, let's communicate with your dick now," he said with a laugh. 

But Merlin wasn't listening because he was too busy pushing into Arthur's hands as they wrapped, vice-like and too rough, around his cock. It felt amazing. They were fucking awesome. He was going to come everywhere—all over Arthur's softening dick and hopefully, all over his balls and—fuck, those nipples...

"Come on," Arthur whispered.

And Merlin did. 

And then? Then they lived happily ever after. 

~~Semen.~~ Amen.

———

Soundtrack of Ridiculousness

Blah Blah by Ke$sha feat. 3OH!3  
Wild Ones by Flo Rida ft. Sia  
Glad You Came by The Wanted  
Call Me Maybe by Ben Howard (Cover of Carly Rae Jepson’s song)  
Boyfriend by Justin Bieber 


End file.
